Defending Democracy with Marc Elias

With less than a week before the final midterm election ballots are cast, Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias has been inundated with questions about what issues are putting him on alert. In this episode Marc outlines his top five concerns, from most immediate to most dire - including meddling by the Trump administration and the servile red state officials that seem willing to do anything to keep hold of power in Congress.

When reporters asked Attorney General Todd Blanche if the Justice Department might try to block states from certifying midterm results, he didn’t say no. “Of course there are scenarios that we could all come up with hypothetically — some doomsday scenario,” he said. The federal government has no power over state certification. But this administration keeps leaving the door open to interfering with elections. Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias breaks down what Blanche said and why it’s a warning sign for what's to come.

On the morning of Jan. 6, 2021, hours before the attack on the U.S. Capitol, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton took the stage at Donald Trump’s rally and told the crowd, “We will not quit fighting.” Now he’s running for the U.S. Senate.Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias walks through Paxton’s record of attacking free and fair elections. He sued to throw out the results in four states at the U.S. Supreme Court. His office spent more than 22,000 hours hunting for voter fraud and produced 16 prosecutions. He went after election officials, campaign volunteers and Beto O’Rourke. With Senate control on the line and Election Day less than two weeks away, Marc explains what’s at stake in Texas and why we all need to be paying attention if the race is close.

Michigan GOP Senate candidate Mike Rogers was caught on leaked audio telling county Republicans he wants the Republican National Committee to send retired or off-duty police officers to polling places in Detroit — and only Detroit — as poll watchers. “All you got to do is open your jacket and you see the badge on the belt,” he said.As Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias explains, this isn't a new tactic. In 1981, the RNC sent armed off-duty police officers to polling places in Black and Latino neighborhoods in New Jersey. The lawsuit that followed put the RNC under a court order that barred these programs for more than three decades. That order ended in 2017 as Donald Trump began his first term. 

On the first day of early voting in Texas, a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney stood next to a Bible and a framed photo of Donald Trump and warned election officials: “I will hunt you down and prosecute you.” Days earlier, the Justice Department’s No. 2 official told California election officials they could face criminal charges for counting about 20,000 ballots the administration calls “likely non-citizens.” The same official later admitted, “We’re not perfect.” Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias explains how Trump left election officials with no good options and why it’s part of a larger plan to challenge the results after Election Day.